Of secrets and hidden lives
by Shamira The Guardian
Summary: Harry and Matilda are siblings who were separated at birth for unknown reasons but knew each other through a psychic link, after Matilda is adopted by Miss Honey she convinces her to rescue and adopt Harry from the Dursleys. Years later the two siblings go to Hogwarts along with identical sisters and have to brave the challenges ahead. (Rewrite of A magic touch)
1. Chapter 1

**Of secrets and hidden lives**

**Chapter 1**

**This is a rewrite of A magic touch, so if you haven't read it already go do so. Ideas and feedback is welcome.**

For long as Matilda could remember she had been having strange dreams, sometimes they were like she was seeing the memories of someone, other times she would be in an empty space with a little boy and they would just talk to each other. Matilda hated when she saw the memories, they would be filled with adults treating her worse than the Wormwoods did or of a snake-faced man pointing a stick at her and shooting a green light. Matilda preferred to be with the boy, where they could just talk to each other, until age four the boy didn't even know his name, he thought it was freak, he thankfully learned that his name was Harry Potter when he went to school. Matilda eventually managed to work out that when she dreamed of them memories that they belonged to Harry, that the boy who shared her dream-scape was being abused, and she could do nothing to stop it.

* * *

Matilda and Harry were in their shared dream-scape, which they had shaped to look like a library containing every book they every read, and considering how much Matilda read there was quite a lot of books. Matilda was telling Harry about her recent defeat of the Trunchbull and being adopted by Miss Honey after her parents abandoned.

"That's great." Harry said. "Not your parents abandoning you! But you getting adopted by someone who will be nice to you. Better than I'll get."

"Don't give up, Harry." Matilda tried to comfort him. "Someone will have to notice eventually. Maybe, if I can find where you live, I can convince Miss Honey to help."

"But how would you explain to her about me?"

"She saw my telekinetic powers."

"But she explained it as you not being able to unleash your potential, plus you don't have your power anymore."

Matilda sighed in defeat. "I'll find a way to help you one day, Harry."

Matilda's chance to help Harry came with the news that her school was temporarily shutting down for renovations, so the students of the school were spit up and sent to other schools until they could return, and Matilda was getting sent to a school in Little Whinging, Surrey. Going with Matilda was Lavender, Amanda, Bruce and Hortensia.

"Harry!" Matilda called out when she saw Harry, for the first time in real life.

"Matilda?" Harry asked as he walked over to her. "What are you doing here?"

"We got moved here while our school is under renovation." Matilda explained. "Now you don't have to alone."

"I wouldn't be so sure of that." Harry pointed to where Dudley and his gang were coming over.

Matilda wasn't afraid however. "How about I introduce you to Hortensia?" she said.

By the end of the day Hortensia had a week long detention for beating up Dudley and his gang when they tried to bully Harry and Matilda.

* * *

"Do you think this will work?" Matilda asked.

Matilda and Hortensia were standing in front of number 4 Privet Drive at night dressed head to toe in black.

"If it doesn't they'll at least get spooked." Hortensia replied.

Hortensia picked up the garden sprayer she had and started spraying the liquid in it onto the front lawn in coordinated movements while Matilda held a light so she could see where she was spraying. Once she was done and the sprayer was empty Hortensia took out a match box and lit one of the matches, she then dropped it on the liquid on the lawn, both girls then ran away as the liquid caught fire and words of fire became apparent.

In the morning many people were gathered in front of the Dursley's lawn, burned into the grass on the front lawn were the words, 'Child abusers', with an arrow pointing at the house. The Dursleys still refused to leave the house and had called the police about vandalism, which was exactly what Matilda wanted. The police were in the house when Harry came walking in.

"F-Harry, get out!" Vernon yelled at him.

"Sorry, uncle Vernon, please don't hit me again! I'll go back to my cupboard, I'll be good." Harry said his rehearsed lines in a weak voice.

The officer looked over to the Dursleys with angry eyes and the adults looked worried, secretly Harry felt smug that Matilda's plan was working.

Matilda's plan was to have the Dursleys arrested or at least not allowed to take care of Harry anymore, then Miss Honey would come in and adopt him, now that Miss Honey had all her money and property back she could afford to be a single parent to two children or more. Matilda had burned 'child abusers' into the front lawn to get people to talk about the Dursleys and suspect the truth, it was just a bonus that they were stupid enough to phone the police, thankfully Harry had been given a script of what to say in front of the police if they came so he was able to drop the Dursleys deep in trouble, even deeper when he showed the officer the cupboard that he was forced to sleep in.

By the time Matilda and the others could return to their own school Harry was going with them and was adopted by Miss Honey.


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2**

**I'm going to be calling Miss Honey, Jenifer, from now on.**

Harry and Matilda were sitting in a room at the doctors along with their adopted mother, after Jenifer had managed to fully adopt Harry she insisted on both of them getting the full medical treatment to check for any possible problems and to get them inoculations that their previous families had neglected to give them. Doctor Davis came back into the room with the results of their blood tests, she had a look of confusion on her face.

"Miss Honey." The Doctor addressed Jenifer.

"Yes?" Jenifer responded.

"It says in the forms you filled out that Harry and Matilda were adopted from two different families and are not related. But the blood test show that they are brother and sister with the same parents."

"How is this possible?" Jenifer asked.

Meanwhile, Harry and Matilda looked at each other in shock, they were actual brother and sister.

"Harry did live with his aunt and uncle, maybe his parents were the Wormwoods." Suggested Doctor Davis.

"No, it said on Harry's adoption papers that his parents had the last name of Potter and were both dead." Jenifer dismissed the theory.

"We'll work this out later, it's not in my jurisdiction anyway. Both children are fine except for some slight malnutrition from Harry that can easily be fixed by having full meals, all that's left is the standard jabs for children."

After some injections the two siblings went home with their adopted mother with their pockets full of lollypops.

"I can't believe that we're actual brother and sister." Harry said.

"It seems impossible." Matilda agreed.

"I know. Though, maybe being siblings is why we were able to share our dreams."

"I do remember reading something about siblings having a rumoured psychic bonds, but that was between identical siblings. This is confusing."

Matilda flopped down on her bed, hugging her doll close.

"Maybe things will become clearer once we're older." Harry suggested. "That what the Dursleys always said to Dudley on a lot of questions he asked."

"Maybe," Matilda agreed.

* * *

Harry sat in his class as his adopted mum taught him at the rest of the class, due to his sister's high intellect she had been moved up in the years and therefore didn't share any classes with him other than PE, this led to others trying to bully her but Matilda had quickly proven that she could cause chaos for those people and not get blamed for it and so they eventually left her alone.

"Now class." Jenifer said, calling everyone's attention. "We have some new students today that have just moved here, so I hope to all make them feel welcome. Come in girls!"

Into the room walked two almost identical twins girls that Harry recognised from somewhere, both had hair to their waists and wore red dresses, white socks and black shoes, the only difference was that one girl had red hair that covered the left side of her face and her visible eye was blue while the other girl had black hair, brown eyes and wore a red neckerchief.

"This is Vida and Layla Saxton." Jenifer motioned to the red-haired girl then to her sister. "They've come here all the way from Japan so they may not understand some of what you're saying."

Vida and Layla bowed to the class before walking over to two spare desks that were next to each other and sitting down without a word.

Harry, meanwhile, had just remembered where he had seen the twins before, they had been part of the family that were moving into the house opposite the Honey home. Harry hoped that they could be friends given that it was only a short walk between their houses. When the bell range for lunch Harry met up with Matilda and together they decided to befriend the Saxton twins, they walked over to where the two girls sat on a bench with an unnamed book between them. As they walked they noticed Luke and his buddies approaching the twins as well, Luke was one of the bullies who cropped up after the Trunchbull left, no longer suppressed by the woman's own bullying, and Luke was the worst one because he like to physically hurt his victims no matter the age and gender and didn't care if he got in trouble for it because of how important his parents were; he was basically a clone of Harry's cousin Dudley.

"Oh no." Harry and Matilda said, even they knew they couldn't take on Luke and his bullying gang, even Hortencia couldn't take them on.

Both children immediately ran to get the teacher, hoping to get one before Luke and his gang could get to any physical bullying.

"Miss Clark!" Harry shouted at the teacher on duty, who was on the opposite end of the playground to where the Saxton twins were. "Luke and his gang are picking on the new girls."

Miss Clark sighed and quickly hurried after Harry and Matilda. When they arrived they were shocked at what they found.

Two of Luke's gang lay on the ground in pain while Luke and the other member of his gang were being sat on by the twins with their arms twisted behind their backs, the twins themselves looked fine, like they hadn't just beaten up the school's biggest bullies. A large crowed of children were gathered around them, many of them cheering the twins on.

Miss Clark stayed still for a few seconds as she processed what she was looking at before blowing her whistle, the cheering immediately stopped and the crowd of children quickly dispersed, the twins just looked up as if they weren't doing anything wrong.

"Layla, Vida! Get off of those boys this instant!" Miss Clark ordered.

Vida and Layla looked at each other before shrugging and getting off the bullies, who immediately crawled away from them.

"Boys, go see the nurse before reporting to the headmaster. Girls come with me!"

Layla picked up their book from where in lay on the ground and dusted in off before the two of them linked hands and followed after Miss Clark as if they weren't in trouble.

"What happened?" Matilda asked Bruce.

"It was unreal, Luke went up to them and smacked their book out of their hands, he said some nasty things to them while cracking his knuckles, Vida said something to him that I couldn't quite hear and he went to punch her, them next thing I know both of the twins are beating him and his gang up." Bruce replied.

"How" Harry asked.

"I don't know, it happened so fast."

Many children on the playground found themselves afraid of the Saxton twins after that incident.

* * *

Harry and Matilda heard from their mum that the Saxton twins had been suspended for causing harm to Luke and his gang, they also heard that Luke's parents as well as they parents of his gang were pulling their sons out of the school which was a relief. Harry and Matilda were disappointed that they couldn't make friends with the Saxton twins at school but a few days later they saw their chance when they saw the two of them sitting on the swings at the local park.

"Hi." Matilda said cheerfully as she stood in front of the two girls.

The twins looked up at her with unreadable expressions.

"I'm Matilda and this is my brother Harry. You're Vida and Layla, right?"

The twins continued to stare at the two of them for a moment.

"Yes." when the answer came they weren't sure which twin had spoken.

A few awkward moments passed.

"Uh, would you like to play with us?" Harry asked.

"We'd rather not." They managed to catch Vida as the one who spoke.

"Oh, okay." Harry and Matilda said.

The two walked away before things could get anymore uncomfortable.

"That went well(!)" Harry said sarcastically.

"I wonder why they didn't want to play." Matilda said.

"Maybe they just don't like being around others, I know I was wary of friends because of my past experiences, maybe they're the same."

The two siblings shrugged and went back home.

* * *

It was the weekend and Harry and Matilda were out playing with Lavender and a few other children from their class in the huge playing fields, they were running close to the edge of some trees when someone shouted at them.

"Stop!"

The friends stopped and turned to see the Saxton twins running over.

"What?" Lavender asked.

"You were about to step on a Fairy ring." Vida said as if it were obvious.

Vida and Layla stepped past them to examine a ring of mushrooms on the ground that the group of friends had been heading for.

"Fairy ring?" Harry asked.

The twins sighed. "A Fairy ring is where Fae creatures gather to dance and play by the light of the moon." Vida explained. "If it had been damaged then Fae creatures would no longer gather here."

"Oh." Everyone said.

The group of friends were sceptical, they weren't quite at the age where they stopped believing in fairy tails but they were still old enough to start questioning what they were told, except for Matilda whose advanced intelligence stopped her believing in fairy tails not that long ago and Harry who was always told fairy tails don't exist.

"They still might not gather here, they are very good at picking up emotions, even hours afterwards, and negative emotions will push them away. We need to give something as a sign of good faith." Vida said.

The friends looked to each other, it was obvious that the twins, or at least Vida as Layla had yet to say anything, believed what they were saying. Matilda saw a chance to get past the twin's walls.

"Can I help?" she asked.

The twins looked at her before nodding their heads.

"What do we give them?" Harry asked.

"It needs to be something of value." Vida said.

"I've already spent all of my allowance." Lavender said, the other nodding with her.

"Not money." Vida corrected. "Something of personal value. The easiest thing would be to make something for them, like a house or furniture."

"Okay, I get it." They said.

The friends went into the trees and picked up some fallen sticks, leaves and other forest litter, they then pilled it on the grass along with spare things from their pockets. The group of friends and the twins them spent the next hour creating a fairy house and some furniture.

"Will they actually use this?" someone asked, looking at the fairy house.

The fairy house, in truth, wasn't that great; a person stumbling upon it probably wouldn't be able to recognise some of the chairs as chairs at all and the house itself was poorly put together and likely to fall apart at any time.

"Of course not." Vida said. "But it's the thought that will count."

The twins then both looked up into the sky.

"We need to get home, see you later." Vida said as she and her sister ran in the direction of their house.


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter 3**

"I'm a little scared." Lavender said.

A few others nodded in agreement.

"You can go home if you want." Vida told her. "And miss seeing the Fae."

It was dark outside and the group of friends, along with a the rest of Harry's class and a couple of adult supervisors after Jenifer thought it'd be a good class activity, had joined the Saxton twins in camping out near the fairy ring, they had come in hope of seeing some Fae creatures. It had been a couple of weeks since they had made the fairy house, the twins had been more open and friendly around them but still would obviously rather keep to themselves.

"What do we do now?" a boy asked.

"Sleep, if we are meant to meet with them tonight we will awaken to them dancing, if we aren't we'll wake up and they won't be there." Vida answered.

Everyone around the Saxton twins had quickly learned that Vida was the only twin that spoke, whether Layla couldn't speak or simply chose not to they weren't sure.

Layla brought out a few alarm clocks and set them of the ground.

"What are these for?" Harry asked.

"It's easy to loose track of time when dancing with a fairy and get spirited away, these will ring at 2 in the morning for us to go home at. It will either wake us up to go home or snap us out of the spell we'll be under and then go home."

Everyone soon fell asleep in their sleeping bags and the adults watching over them followed suit despite the fact they were meant to stay awake.

* * *

Matilda groaned slightly as light filtered through her eyelids and woke her from her sleep, her first though was that the play failed and she had slept until morning before she realised the alarm clocks should have gone off before then. Opening her eyes she saw that it was still night and the light that woke her was coming from not far away, looking over she saw figures dancing around a light; she gasped. Fully awake Matilda looked at the fair folk dancing around light that looked like fire but held no colour and had no fuel source, looking at the figures dancing she saw that the Saxton twins were already dancing among them with them. Without noticing she had gotten up and was walking towards the fair folk, she turned to look at the other children and saw that her brother was moving with her and a few others were looking like they were beginning to wake up; but then she felt someone tug on her hand and she was swept up into the dance.

As she dance she quickly joined hands with her brother and danced with him along with other fair folk or occasionally some of the other children, time seemed to blur and Matilda and Harry found it hard to focus on anything other than the feeling of the dance, they didn't even recognise the children they danced with. As they danced they gained a brief moment of clarity, in that brief moment they thought they saw Vida, but then they realised that the eyes were the wrong colour and she almost seemed translucent; then the brief moment of clarity was over and they were swept back into the dance and no longer cared about what they saw.

Everyone was so caught up in the dance that it came as a huge shock when the alarm clocks tied around them went off.

* * *

Harry and Matilda shot up from where they were lying on the ground, after a few seconds they finally got their brains in gear and shut off the alarm clocks, it took a couple of more seconds for the other alarm clocks to be shut off. Everyone rubbed their eyes.

"Time to go home." Vida said.

Everyone looked up to see that the twins already had their sleeping bags rolled up and under their arms, the twins then turned and headed home leaving everyone to make their own way or wait for their parents who were coming at the appropriate time.

As everyone waited to be picked up some children, including the Potter twins, were wondering if what they had experienced was just a dream, but most were complaining that nothing had happened.

"It felt so real, but we woke up when the alarms went off." Lavender complained, the situation confusing her.

"We're all confused." Harry said with a nod.

"Those who had the dream anyway." Matilda said, looking at the many children complaining about nothing happening.

"I wonder if this means anything." Harry said.

All three shrugged.

* * *

A few days after the encounter with the Fae Harry and Matilda remembered about the girl who had looked like Vida, so they decided to ask the Saxton twins if they had seen the girl as well.

"You say her?" Vida asked in surprise.

"Yeah, I take it you saw her to." Harry answered.

"Who is she?" Matilda asked.

"None of your business." Vida said, suddenly on guard.

Harry and Matilda then watched as Vida seemed to be arguing with herself.

"No, they don't need to know. They could tell someone." She whispered to herself.

Looking over at Layla she seemed to be staring at Vida.

"You really think so? Alright! If you want to."

Vida turned to look at Harry and Matilda, the two took a step back when they saw the look in her eyes that she shared with Layla.

"We'll tell you who she is, but you have to swear_ never_ to tell anyone." Vida said.

"We swear." Harry and Matilda said.

Vida shook her head. "Swear on your magic!" she said.

"What?" Matilda questioned.

"Just do it!"

"Okay. We swear on our magic not to tell." Matilda and Harry looked at each other in confusion and they spoke.

Vida and Layla seemed to relax after that. Vida then grabbed Matilda's hand while Layla grabbed Harry's and they pulled them behind them towards their house, Layla produced a key and opened the front door and the twins then pulled them up the stairs and into their room. As they were getting pulled along Harry and Matilda were able to notice that the Saxton home was built the same way as their home and the decoration was very modern before they were in the twin's room. The twins room had white wallpaper which was covered in many drawings done in colouring pencil, there was a bookcase containing many books and various things, a large wardrobe, a mirror, a large stack of jigsaw puzzles, a desk with draws and a double bed.

"Why are we here?" Harry asked.

Layla pointed at their mirror, instructing them to look in it. When Harry and Matilda looked into the mirror they saw all of them there with one extra person standing in-between Vida and Layla, she looked exactly like the twins and had Vida's red hair and Layla's brown eyes, even her clothes were the same; the girl waved nervously. The two siblings looked back and forth between the mirror and the empty space between the twins.

"How?" Matilda questioned.

"She is our sister, was our sister." Vida answered.

The twins sat on their bed and allowed Harry and Matilda to join them. Vida sighed sadly as she began to explain.

"When we were born we were born triplets, for reasons we're not sure on our sister, Arianna, died shortly after birth." Vida said, she and Layla were beginning to cry. "But Aria's soul didn't move on and has grown up with us as a ghost or something. Only we can see her without the aid of a mirror of something, or what happened with the Fae we suppose."

Without thinking Matilda and Harry embraced the twins in a hug as they cried, the twins stiffened for a moment before relaxing and letting themselves calm down before pulling away.

"We've never told anyone about Aria." Vida admitted. "We were afraid our aunt and uncle would try and get rid of her."

"What about your parents?" Matilda asked.

The twins looked down.

"We live with our aunt and uncle, we'd rather not talk about our parents." Vida answered.

"Don't worry, we understand." Harry said.


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter 4**

Years had passed since Harry and Matilda had found out about Aria, the two siblings had become friends with the triplets despite one of them only being able to communicate through her sisters and not seen without a mirror. Soon after befriending the triplets the siblings and the their adopted mother met their aunt and uncle, from meeting them the siblings got the impression that it was best just to ignore them, the triplets seemed to do that. As the friends grew the triplets would teach them about Fae and magic, involving Harry and Matilda in rituals that would apparently strengthen their connection to the magic of the Earth; everything the triplets taught them came from homemade-looking books that the triplets only let them see on very rare occasions and were as secret as Aria, all the triplets said about them was that they were left to them.

Harry and Matilda would sometimes sneak out after dark with Vida and Layla to play with the Fae creatures or preform the rituals; in all honest Harry and Matilda didn't know if the rituals were real but the triplets seemed to believe they were with conviction. With each time they played with the Fae Harry and Matilda found it easier to get moments of clarity, Vida explained that they were getting used to the power of the Fae which allowed them to break though the spell over them easier; during these moments of clarity they would get to know some of the Fae, like a female Imp named Jack, a Fairy named Ivy, etc.

* * *

It was summer time and Harry, Matilda and the Saxton triplets were gathered in the backyard of the Honey home, enjoying the rare English summer sun as they ate their breakfast. The loud screech of owls startled them and they looked up as four owls dropped a letter on all but Aria's lap, the owls then quickly flew away.

"How rude." Vida said as she set her breakfast to one side and picked up her letter, the others quickly following her lead.

"What just happened?" Harry asked, referring to the owls.

"Some owls just dropped off post for each of us. Most wizards and witches like to use owls to deliver their mail because of how reliable they are."

Harry and Matilda just shrugged, over the years they had quickly come to accept whatever Vida said when it came to magical things.

"Harry Potter..." Harry read out his name and address from the envelope which was so accurate that it knew his bedroom.

"Heather Potter?" Matilda questioned when she read hers.

'That must be your real name then, since it was never actually changed to Matilda Honey' Layla quickly wrote down on her notepad and showed Matilda.

After becoming friends Harry and Matilda had learned that Layla was a mute, both had learned sign language but Layla preferred to write things down, which she could do very quickly due to years of practice.

"At least we know that the Potters were my parents for sure now." Matilda said with a shrug. "Though it's going to be weird since real name is Heather but I've always been called Matilda for as long as I remember."

"You should talk to the Goblins about getting your name changed then." Vida said.

Matilda just nodded at the suggestion.

All four opened their letters, inside was an acceptance letter to a magic school called Hogwarts, a list of the school supplies that they would need and a ticket or a train called the Hogwarts express on a platform called 93/4. **(I'm not writing out the full letter)**

_{Strange.} _Aria said from where she was floating behind her sisters._ {Shouldn't there be mention of someone from the school coming to explain everything?}_

"Maybe because all of us had magical parents they assume we have a way of knowing what to do." Vida suggested.

"What?" Matilda asked, having not heard Aria's question.

"Aria asked why the school wouldn't send a guide."

"Oh, okay."

"Where would we get this stuff?" Harry asked, looking at his list of objects for the school.

"The wizarding world has a place called Diagon alley, we can ask aunt Martha to drop us off with your mum." Vida said.

Harry and Matilda knew better that to ask why Martha couldn't guide them around the alley.

"How are we going to explain this to mum?" Matilda asked.

"She already knows about the powers you had, hopefully it won't take that long to convince her." Harry said.

* * *

Thankfully it didn't take long to convince Jenifer about magic and Hogwarts, apparently she had met and became friends with a boy who had gone to Hogwarts and told her about it, though he had told her that it was a school for the gifted rather than a magic school. Vida and Layla's aunt had agreed to take them all to Diagon alley, she said she had some business there anyway.

A few hours after the children had convinced Jenifer of magic there was frantic knocking at the door, when Matilda opened it she saw Lavender standing there with a Hogwarts acceptance letter in her hands.

"You got one too?" Matilda asked.

"I knew it, you're a witch!" Lavender exclaimed.

Matilda quickly invited Lavender inside and up to her room where her brother and the triplets were.

"Lavender's a witch as well." Matilda said as she entered.

"Thought so." Vida said. "Did you find out with your letter?" she asked Lavender.

"Actually, I've known about magic for a while. My cousin's a wizard and told me all about the magical world." Lavender replied.

"So, you going to Hogwarts as well?" Harry asked.

Lavender looked down, as if ashamed.

"Sorry, no." she replied. "I'm joining my cousin in the one in France, he told my parents that he went to Hogwarts for his first year and experienced bullying and prejudice so much that he had to move, my parents don't want me to go through that so I'm not going to Hogwarts. The reason I brought the letter is so that I had evidence when I told you about magic, but it seems you all already know."

Matilda smiled. "We understand. But is Hogwarts really that bad?" she asked.

"According to my cousin it is. You know, you could join me." Lavender said hopefully.

"But we only got our Hogwarts letter." Harry said in confusion.

"So did I. But you have to write to the schools of other countries if you want to go to them, my parents had already planned ahead in asking for the French school's acceptance letter before my Hogwarts one arrived."

"Well, we're going to Diagon alley tomorrow, we can look into it then." Matilda said.

"To be honest we have heard that Hogwarts isn't as good as it once was." Vida admitted. "But we don't really care much for learning in a school."

"We can tell that by the number of times you've been suspended or skipped class or school." Lavender said cheekily.

Vida and Layla rolled their eyes but smiled in response.


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter 5**

Martha drove to London with Vida and Layla in the back of her car and the Honeys following behind in their own car, both parked in a driving lot. Martha led the way to a pub called the Leaky Caldron, she pushed her way through the crowds to the back exit, they eventually reached the backyard of the pub. Martha pulled out her wand and counted the bricks under her breath until she came to the correct ones and tapped her wand on them, the bricks then folded out of the way until an archway was revealed that led to a bustling alleyway.

"Welcome to Diagon alley." Martha said. "Stay together so you don't get lost, head to Gringotts first, meet back here in three hours."

Martha pointed at the large building that stuck out the most before disappearing into the crowds.

"Let's get going then." Jenifer said kindly.

The four children and Jenifer made there way over to the large building named Gringotts, which was the wizarding world bank, and went inside. The main hall of Gringottts was large and desks were lining either side with small creatures with long noses, wrinkly skin and sharp teeth weighing gold and gems. Thanks to Vida and Layla the Honey family knew that these creatures were goblins, they also knew that it was in their best interest to remain polite and respectful towards them.

"Um, excuse me." Jenifer said to the Goblin in front of her. "My children and I are new to the wizarding world and I need to know if there's anything important I need to set up for them, such as their own accounts."

The goblin looked at her before ringing a bell which called another goblin to his side.

"Take these people to set up new accounts." the first goblin told the second.

"Of course." Said the second goblin, he then turned to Jenifer and the children. "Follow me." He said and walked off.

Jenifer and the children followed the goblin to an office where he sat at a desk, there were enough chairs for all of them to sit as well.

"I am Lurlus and will be your account manager. Who are the accounts for?" the goblin asked, pulling out a piece of parchment and a quill.

"Just my two children here, Harry and Matilda." Jenifer answered.

"And what are their full names?"

"Harry Potter and Matilda Worm...sorry, I mean Heather Potter."

Lurlus dropped the parchment and quill and looked closely at Harry and Matilda before staring intently at Jenifer.

"What did you say?" he asked.

The Honey family didn't understand the true cause of his confusion, so they assumed it was the slip up with Matilda's name.

"Apparently my name is Heather Potter but until yesterday I though it was Matilda Wormwood, somehow the people I thought were my parents weren't actually my parents." Matilda answered.

Lurlus looked suspiciously at the two children.

"I see." he said. "I'm afraid I'm going to have to verify your identities before we can go any further.

Lurlus reached into his desk and brought out some special-looking parchment and a dagger.

"I need you both to prick your fingers and let a drop of blood fall onto this parchment, the blood will then form your true names." he explained.

Reluctantly the two children stuck out their hands and allowed Lurlus to prick their middle fingers, the blood fell onto the parchment as Lurlus chanted something in a language they didn't understand, once that was done the cuts on their fingers healed. Everyone watched as the blood on the parchment seeped in before moving around to form words; Harry James Potter and Heather Lilly Potter. Lurlus gasped.

"Please wait a moment." He said before hurrying out of the room.

Harry and Matilda looked at Vida and Layla, looking for answers, and received shrugs in response.

A few minutes later Lurus came back in.

"Mr and Miss Potter already have bank accounts and their account manager would like to see them." he said.

"We already have accounts?" Harry asked.

"Left to you by your parents. Now, follow me."

Lurlus led them through more passageways until they reached a expertly crafted and designed door.

"Only Mr and Miss Potter and their guardian may go in." he said, looking at Layla and Vida.

Jenifer and her adopted children looked ready to protest but the two smiled in understanding.

"That's fine." Vida said. "We need to get some money from our trust vault anyway."

"I'll take you back to the main hall." Lurlus said, he then turned to Jenifer and the Potter children. "Just knock and go in." the goblin then walked back the way they came with Vida and Layla following behind.

Harry knocked on the door.

"Enter." A voice said.

They opened the door and saw another goblin sitting behind a desk.

"Ah, Mr and Miss Potter, I'm glad you have come. Though I didn't know that Miss Potter would be here, according to official reports she's dead." The goblin said.

"What?" Matilda asked in surprise.

"I can see you're surprised, take a seat and we can work this out. I am Ragnok, the Potter account manager."

All three sat down in the seats in front of Ragnok's desk.

"And who may you be?" Ragnok asked Jenifer.

"I'm Jenifer Honey, their adopted mother."

"Though, thinking about it you may not actually be my adopted mum since you adopted me as Matilda Wormwood, not Heather Potter." Matilda replied.

"Mr Rognok, you said my sister should be dead, what do you mean?" Harry asked the goblin.

"It was reported that Heather Potter, daughter of Lilly and James Potter, died shortly after birth while in the emergency care ward at a muggle hospital. The Potters had apparently been forced to go to a muggle hospital as it had been the closest when Lilly Potter had un-expectantly gone into labour and it had been too much or a risk to teleport to St Mungos. So I'd like to know how you appear to be live and well before me, Miss Potter."

"I don't know how, sir, I grew up thinking I was the daughter of a family called the Wormwoods, and I don't think they knew I wasn't their daughter." Matilda answered.

"So how did you come upon your brother?

"There seems to be a psychic link between us, we grew up knowing each other in our dreams but were unaware of our relation, I lived with my aunt and uncle who weren't very nice so when my sister found me she convinced mum to adopt me after they got arrested. We found out about being related after a medical test." Harry answered.

"I see. Anyway, the reason you have been brought here is because both of you are the soul heirs of the Potter family as well as a few other titles that have been passed down through the generations, unfortunately you can not claim these titles and will remain only Potter heirs until you both come of age. There is going to be some complications since Miss Potter was thought to be dead such as no trust vault being left to her but that can quickly be rectified as it's her right as a Potter heir. For a small fee Gringotts can rectify any problems there was with Miss Potter's adoption."

"I'd like that very much please." Matilda said politely. "Also, is it possible to change my name, since I'm used to being called Matilda?"

"You will have to wait until you come of age of are emancipated to be able to change your name, Miss Potter."

"Oh, okay. I'll just tell people to call me Matilda anyway."

"Now, all we need to do for now is for you both and your guardian to sign some paper work."

The next ten minutes were spent with the Potters and Jenifer signing various parchments to do with bank work as well as making sure that both Potter children were properly adopted by Jenifer, when the family left Rognok's office they were given a key to each of the Potter trust vaults as well as two magic purses filled with one-hundred galleons each from said trust vaults. The family found Vida and Layla waiting patiently in the lobby for them, sharing a book between them.

"I hope we didn't keep you waiting too long." Jenifer said to the two.

"You didn't." Vida replied, putting away the books.

"Let's go get our stuff then." Matilda said eagerly.

"We probably should try and get our wands today." Vida said, eyeing how packed Diagon alley was. "It's a big shopping day and the wand shop will probably be packed."

Harry and Matilda reluctantly agreed.

Layla signed something to her sister.

"That's right, according to our books there's a better place to get wands anyway." Vida whispered to the Potter twins.

The shopping trip was pretty uneventful, with most shops all you needed to ask for was the first year set and you got all you needed for the school year, the only thing of note that happed was Matilda having to be physically dragged out of the book shop by Harry and Layla because she had been grabbing too many books. At the end of the shopping trip they met Martha at the Leaky Caldron and drove home.


	6. Chapter 6

**Chapter 6**

The day after the shopping trip Vida and Layla were going to visit their grandma and invited the Potter siblings along, after they arrived the two sisters had quickly dragged the siblings after them into the large woods that were behind their grandma's house saying that they were 'going to get their wands'.

"Are you sure about this?" Matilda asked.

"We're going to the Midnight Festival and the instructions on how to get there without a Fae are written in here, we have to follow them or risk getting lost." Vida said, holding one of the sisters' secret books in her hand. "Now, first thing we need to do is find some standing stones."

The children explored the woods until they came upon a clearing with stones sticking out of the ground around the edge, in the centre were some stones that someone had stacked carefully one on top another.

"Perfect." Vida said, she then read from the book. "Let's see. Face the direction of the rising sun with a lit candle and close your eyes, clear your mind of all thoughts and walk forward until you hear the ringing of bells, extinguish your candle and open your eyes, if this has worked it should be dark and a bonfire should be glowing in the distance to guide you to the Midnight Festival. In order for this to work you must believe it will work."

Holding lit candles in their hands the four closed their eyes tightly and faced East, they then began walking forward, after what seemed like forever but a moment at the same time they heard the sound of sleigh bells and well as distant laughing and music, they blew out their candles before opening their eyes. All around them it was dark despite it being midday when they had started, and off in the distance they saw the light of a fire, with hands held they made their way towards the fire. When they emerged from the tree line they saw many tents set in a huge circle around a bonfire that many Fae were dancing around, they had sleigh bells tied around their wrist or ankles that rang with every movement, a large group of Fae were playing instruments, some familiar to the children and some not, there was snow covering the ground despite how warm it was and it never seemed to turn to slush despite being stepped on constantly, the atmosphere of the place was one of eternal happiness.

"Hello, human children." a voice addressed them.

The children turned to see a girl who looked to be fifteen, she had silver hair entwined with feather and beads and golden eyes, she wore a short dress of wolf fur, black leggings, and leather wrist and leg guards decorated with swirling patterns, she wore a satchel over her right shoulder and a sword was attached to her back.

"Hello, oh noble Fae." Vida replied. "My friends and sister and I search for wands."

"I know where to get them, I will guide you during your time here to ensure you do not become lost. Specking of so, your spirit friend seems to be wondering off." the Fae said.

The children turned to see that Aria had gained the visible form she usually had around Fae, and she looking longingly at the Fae dancing around the Fae.

"Aria." Vida said sharply, snapping Aria out of her daze and drawing her attention. "This Fae will guide us while we are here."

"You may call me Maria, human child, I am a Shapeshifter." she announced proudly.

Maria guided the children through the Midnight Festival until they reached a large red tent, the inside was much bigger than the outside, standing behind a desk was a un-earthly woman with pale skin, shining black eyes and long blond hair that went out of view below the desk and had many of the strands pulled into braids, she wore a dress that was a patchwork of fabrics and a deep-red cloak covering it.

"Greetings human children." The woman said, her voice barely a whisper yet clearly heard. "You may call me Lady Blackmore. You seek conducts for your magic."

"Yes, how did you know?" Matilda asked.

"Your minds speak clearly of your desires."

Lady Blackmore reached to a large shelf behind her and brought out five simple looking boxes.

"I was told when I received these that human children would one day come here in search of magic conducts." She said, laying them out on her desk, one in front of each child.

Harry picked up his first, once in his hand it gave off a brilliant light.

"Yew wood, with a feather of the Blackbird of Cilgwri, a chip of antler of the Stag of Rhedynfre, and the nectar of a white lilly for the core." Lady Blackmore said.

Matilda picked up her wand, it gave off a brilliant light of a different colour.

"Ash wood with a feather of the Eagle of Gwernabwy, a chip of antler of the Stag of Rhedynfre, and the nectar of a white lilly for the core."

Vida picked up her wand, it too gave off a brilliant light of a different colour.

"Ebony, with a crystal core."

Layla picked up her wand, once again a brilliant light was given off.

"Ebony, with the feather of an Angel for the core."

Aria looked at Lady Blackmore with confused eyes, she was just a spirit, she couldn't use a wand let alone pick one up.

"When I was left with these wands I was also left with this." Lady Blackmore withdrew a glowing stone from the sleeve of her dress, she then threw it at Aria.

Aria went for the automatic reaction of catching it in her hands and too everyone's shock and her own she caught it, she then felt immense pain for the first time, when the pain went away she collapsed and took in a deep breath. Then she realised 'deep breath'...she was breathing! She felt her heart racing...heart? She was alive!"

"I'm alive!" Aria shouted in shock, her speech was very lazy however due to never physically speaking before.

Vida and Layla had felt everything their sister had gone through and felt her become alive, they collapsed by her side and pulled her into a strong hug while they cried.

"How?" Harry and Matilda asked.

"I do not know, I was only told to give it to her." Lady Blackmore answered.

"Even we do not understand the ways of magic." Maria said. "But we are content to let it remain a mystery."

After the Saxton triplets were done with their tearful reunion they all tried to stand up, but Aria fell down again due to never having to walk before and therefore not able to control her balance, she was quickly supported by her sisters. Aria then reached forward and picked up her wand and it gave off a brilliant light.

"Ebony, with ichor for the core." Lady Blackmore said with a smile.

"Thank you." Vida said gratefully. "I don't know what I could give you in return for what you have given us."

Lady Blackmore held up a hand and shook her head.

"There's nothing to pay." she said. "I was mealy holding onto these items until you came to get them, it is not my right to get paid for them."

Maria left the tent with the children following, Aria supported between her sisters. They made their way back through the festival but as they past a tent filled with animals they children couldn't help but stop to look at them. As they looked Harry was drawn to a snowy white owl, when he held out his arms it jumped from its perch and onto his arm, he then rubbed it under its chin. At the same time Matilda was drawn to a completely back cat with amber eyes, she picked it up and it nuzzled her face. A quick exchange of some valuables and the Potters had two new pets.

"I think I'll call him Mau." Matilda said. "It's the Egyptian word for cat."

Harry though hard for a new name for his owl before settling on one he had read in his history books.

"I'll call her Hedwig." he said.

"I hope Miss Honey won't mind your new pets." Vida said.

"If she doesn't we'll hit her with our puppy-eyed look, it never fails." Harry said.

As they walked Vida and Layla were struggling to support their sister, Maria noticed this.

"I'll help you get home, you sister can ride on my back." she said.

Then, suddenly, where Maria had been was a silver horse with golden eyes.

"Wow." The children marvelled at the Shapeshifter.

Maria kneeled down and allowed Vida and Layla to position Aria on her back with Layla sitting behind her to ensure she didn't fall off.

"How are you going to explain Aria to your aunt and uncle." Harry asked.

"You know, we have no idea." Vida said with a shrug.

Getting back to the real world proved easier than leaving it, or maybe it was because Maria was with them, but one second it was night and then with a blink of the eye it was day again and they were approaching the standing stones. When they got back to the grandmother's house Maria lowered herself to allow Layla and Aria off, she then walked back to the forest, turning from a horse to a silver-furred wolf.


	7. Chapter 7

**Chapter 7**

Dumbledore was not happy, not happy at all. Up until the Hogwarts letters had been sent out he had been sure in the knowledge that Harry Potter was with his abusive relatives, which would mean that when the boy came to Hogwarts he would be easily manipulated into a weapon for the light. He knew that the Dursleys would keep magic from Harry which would result in a load of letters being sent before Hagrid would 'rescue' him, but to his surprise the first letter had been answered, Dubmbledore was only slightly worried since Harry could have gotten the letter before the Dursleys found it. The next day Dumbledore sent Hagrid to pick Harry up but a short while later the half-giant returned claiming that no one lived at the Dursley home anymore, after looking into it Dumbledore discovered that the Dursleys were in jail for child abuse and that Harry had been adopted by a woman he couldn't find the identity of; this had happened three to four years ago. Dumbledore tried many times to locate the Potter boy but failed due to unknown reasons.

Then things became even worse for Dumbledore; the key he owned for Harry's trust vault had disappeared signalling that Harry was aware of his inheritance and recalled or changed the key to his vault, then he found out that Harry had been trying to go to a different school, luckily the heads of those schools owed him favours and he got them to not send acceptance letters. Dumbledore could only wait for Harry to arrive at Hogwarts to reassert his control over the boy and hope that his plans for the boy befriending Ron Weasley and getting into Gryffindor went as planned.

* * *

While reading a book on her lap Matilda gave a loud laugh, on the cover of the book it read, 'The adventures of the boy-who-lived'. Matilda had picked it up at the book store and was shocked to find it to be about her brother, some quick research revealed that the wizarding world believed her brother to be a hero after surviving the killing curse from the magic equivalent of Hitler who had killed their parents before turning his wand on Harry but ending up dead instead. Harry's fame had led to many works of fiction being written about him that involved him going on dangerous adventures or facing dangerous creatures; some of these books even had the nerve to be based off true stories. Harry hated these books while Matilda loved them for their absurdity, she especially loved the ones that included her in them in some way such as as a ghost like Aria was.

"Hey, do you think the manticore you slayed was actually a mouse you chased out the house?" Matilda teased her brother, the book she was reading was one of the ones that claimed to be based on a true story.

"At least I wasn't brought back by the power of love." Harry scowled, referencing one of the stories that had brought back Heather Potter from the dead.

"Yet." Matilda replied. "I wonder what the authors will do when I really do return from the 'dead'."

"Maybe rewrite them." Harry theorised.

"Kids, it's time to go!" Jenifer yelled from down the stairs.

"Coming!" they yelled back.

Matilda put her book away and both of them went downstairs with their trunks trailing behind them. When they got downstairs they saw that the Saxton triplets were waiting for them since Jenifer was giving them a lift to the train station, Aria stood between her sisters using crutches to support herself until she got the hand of walking. The triplets' aunt and uncle had taken Aria's existence surprisingly well.

"Come on, let's go!" Aria said impatiently

The children walked out the door and loaded their trunks into or onto the roof of Jenifer's car before settling into the seats, after a long drive they arrived at Kings Cross station.

Why is the passage to platform 93/4 in one of the most busy train stations in Britain?" Matilda questioned. "It could easily be discovered."

The others shrugged their shoulders. With Vida leading the way they walked through the pillar between platform nine and ten that led to platform 93/4, when they got there they saw many families standing next to a large scarlet steam train.

"Now, children. I want you all on your best behaviour." Jenifer said.

"What if a person is bad?" Matilda asked innocently.

"Then go to a teacher. Now, let's get you on the train."

The children dragged their trunks onto the train and found an empty compartment to sit in, they then went back outside to give proper goodbyes to Jenifer before climbing back on the train as it whistled.

"Bye!" Harry and Matilda called out to Jenifer as the train moved out of the station, their voices getting lost amongst all the other children calling their farewells.

After the platform could no longer be seen the two siblings sat down opposite the triplets, Matilda took Mau out of his cage and placed him on her lap and began to stroke him.

The door to the compartment slid open and a red-haired boy with freckles and wearing shabby clothes came in.

"Anyone sitting here?" he asked, pointing to the seat next to Matilda. "Everywhere else is full."

They shook their heads and the boy sat down next to Matilda, he then stared at Harry before quickly looking away and trying to pretend he hadn't looked.

"I'm Ron Weasley, by the way." The boy said.

"I'm Matilda, this is Harry and they are Vida, Layla and Arianna, or Aria for short." Matilda introduced each of them.

Ron seemed to connect some dots he had been struggling to connect earlier.

"Are you Harry Potter?" he blurted out.

Harry nodded.

"Have you really got - you know..."

He pointed at Harry's forehead.

It took a few seconds for Harry to work out what he meant.

"No." He answered, pulling up his fringe to show his bare forehead. "It faded ages ago. I don't know why all those stories about me have it in them, it was a scar, scars fade."

The truth was that the scar hadn't went away until he was five, during one of their combined dream Matilda noticed something evil coming from Harry's scar and they both worked to banish it, when Harry had woke up the next morning his scar had split open with black ooze coming from it, after that the scar had quickly faded.

"It's called creative licence." Aria supplied. "At least it is in the muggle world."

"Oh." Ron seemed disappointed.

A few minutes of silence passed, the triplets had closed their eyes and were most likely having a mental conversation between themselves, Harry was reading one of his school books while Matilda from a book named the tales of Beedle the Bard since she had already memories her first year books.

"So, what house do you want to be in?" Ron asked.

"I don't really see how what house you're in matters, I thought it was just a way of making it easier for dealing with so many students." Vida answered.

"Are you kidding? Of course what house you end up in matters!" Ron exclaimed, he then turned to Harry. "And be careful around the Slytherin, there wasn't a wizard in Slytherin that didn't go bad. You should aim for Gryffindor, that's the best house around and where all the good wizards are."

"And what about the other two houses?" Aria asked.

"Ravenclaw is full of snooty know-it-all's and Hufflepuff isn't bad but it's usually where the leftovers go."

"That doesn't make sense." Matilda said, confusion clear on her face. "Why would Hogwarts have a house for evil wizards and a house for good ones, and being sly and cunning doesn't mean your evil just as being courageous doesn't mean you're good."

"You should really form your own opinion rather than make it off of hearsay, it's attitudes like that that cause the problems in the first place." Vida translated for Layla.

Ron seemed to be panicking for some reason.

"It's not hearsay." he insisted. "It's the house you-know-who came from and every Death Eater and their spawn goes there."

"I ask again, if it's the truth why would Hogwarts have a house for them?" Matilda asked, narrowing her eyes.

"Because..." Ron struggled to find an answer that didn't sound contradictory.

"I thought so."

"Look, each house has it's pros and cons and a stereotype about it, so can you please stop." Harry said. "The Saxtons aren't good around new people, especially when they cause problems."

"Saxtons?" Ron exclaimed, turning to the triplets. "I remember about you, you're a dark family! I bet you're only friends with Harry so you can bring him to your master when he returns." He then turned to Harry and Matilda. "Don't be friends with them, they'll just use you and will end up in Slytherin for sure!"

The compartment suddenly became very cold and Ron was face with four pissed off witches and one pissed off wizard.

"What did you just say?" Vida asked, her voice promising pain.

"How dare you insult our friends like that!" Harry exploded.

Still possessing some survival instincts Ron turned and fled the compartment, Matilda giving him an extra rough push due to her magic reacting to her anger again, her magic then closed the door and locked it.

"Who does that asshole think he is!" Aria shouted, tears coming to her eyes, another side affect of only speaking to her sisters was weak control over her emotions.

Vida and Layla wrapped their arms around their sister to give her comfort.

"I know mum said to go to a teacher if someone is bad but I think we'd give a better lesson." Matilda said with a malicious grin.

Her brother and the triplets gave mirroring grins and spent the rest of the trip planning revenge on Ron Weasley.


	8. Chapter 8

**Chapter 8**

**Some of this chapter will have been taken straight from the book as well as some of the chapters ahead.**

The Hogwarts express rolled into the Hogsmeade station and the students stepped off dressed in their Hogwarts uniforms. As the Saxton triplets and Potter siblings stepped off the train Vida pulled uncomfortably at her robes.

"These things are unbearably itchy." She complained. "Even the uniform they introduced back at cruncham hall was better than this."

"Stop complaining, we'll order some made of better material tomorrow." Aria said while trying to navigate her crutches. "Besides, how do you think I feel about these robes? They keep messing with my crutches."

"Firs' years! Firs' years over here!" a loud voice called out.

The first year students turned to see a giant man holding a lantern while the other years went towards carriages.

"C'mon, follow me - any more firs' years? Mind yer step, now! Firs' years follow me!"

Slipping and stumbling, especially Aria, they followed the giant man down what seemed to be a steep, narrow path. It was so dark on either side of them that Harry thought there must be thick trees there. Nobody spoke much. Neville, a boy the group had met on the train when he was searching for his toad, sniffed once or twice.

"Ye' all get yer firs' sight o' Hogwarts in a sec," the giant man called over his shoulder, "jus' round this bend here."

There was a loud "Oooooh!"

The narrow path had opened suddenly onto the edge of a great black take. Perched atop a high mountain on the other side, its windows sparkling in the starry sky, was a vast castle with many turrets and towers.

"Beautiful." Vida and Aria whispered, the triplets' faces filled with matching wonder.

"No more'n four to a boat!" the giant man called, pointing to a fleet of little boats sitting in the water by the shore.

The Saxtons and Potters sat in different boats due to there being five of them and not wanting to leave the side of their sibling/s. The triplets sat in an empty boat and were quickly joined by a boy with slick blond hair, Aria noticed that two thuggish-looking boys had been following him until they saw that the boat he was in was full and that the boy seemed relieved when they went to another boat, Harry and Matilda sat in a boat and were joined by Neville and a girl with frizzy hair called Hermione, who had met then during her helping search for Neville's toad.

"Everyone in?" shouted Hagrid, who had a boat to himself. "Right then - FORWARD!"

And the fleet of little boats moved off all at once, gliding across the lake, which was as smooth as glass. Everyone was silent, staring up at the great castle overhead. It towered over them as they sailed nearer and nearer to the cliff on which it stood.

"Heads down!" yelled the giant man as the first boats reached the cliff; they all bent their heads and the little boats carried them through a curtain of ivy that hid a wide opening in the cliff face. They were carried along a dark tunnel, which seemed to be taking them right underneath the castle, until they reached a kind of underground harbour, where they clambered out onto rocks and pebbles.

"Oy, you there! Is this your toad?" said the giant man who was checking the boats as people climbed out of them.

"Trevor!" cried Neville blissfully, holding out his hands. Then they clambered up a passageway in the rock after the giant man's lamp, coming out at last onto smooth, damp grass right in the shadow of the castle.

They walked up a flight of stone steps and crowded around the huge, Oak front door.

"Everyone here? You there, still got yer toad?"

The giant man raised a gigantic fist and knocked three times on the castle door.

The door swung open at once. A tall, black-haired witch in emerald-green robes stood there. She had a very stern face and Harry's first thought was that this was not someone to cross.

"The firs' years, Professor McGonagall," said the giant man.

"Thank you, Hagrid. I will take them from here."

She pulled the door wide. The entrance hall was so big you could have fit a whole house in it. The stone walls were lit with flaming torches like the ones at Gringotts, the ceiling was too high to make out, and a magnificent marble staircase facing them led to the upper floors.

They followed Professor McGonagall across the flagged stone floor. Professor McGonagall showed the first years into a small, empty chamber off the hall. They crowded in, standing rather closer together than they would usually have done, peering about nervously.

"Welcome to Hogwarts," said Professor McGonagall. "The start-of-term banquet will begin shortly, but before you take your seats in the Great Hall, you will be sorted into your houses. The Sorting is a very important ceremony because, while you are here, your house will be something like your family within Hogwarts. You will have classes with the rest of your house, sleep in your house dormitory, and spend free time in your house common room."

Professor McGonagall then went on to explain each of the four houses and how the house point system worked.

"The Sorting Ceremony will take place in a few minutes in front of the rest of the school. I suggest you all smarten yourselves up as much as you can while you are waiting."

Her eyes lingered for a moment on Neville's cloak, which was fastened under his left ear, and on Ron's smudged nose. Harry nervously tried to flatten his hair while Matilda took out a ribbon from her pocket and tied it in a bow on her head, the triplets had advised her to play up the cute and innocent look the ribbon gave her to get on the good side of teachers easier, the triplets did nothing as they seemed to have to envious ability to not have a hair out of place without even trying.

"I shall return when we are ready for you," said Professor McGonagall. "Please wait quietly."

She left the chamber.

Once she left the students started talking quietly amongst themselves, mostly about how they were going to get sorted.

"How do you think we'll get sorted?" a random girl turned and asked Matilda.

"Well, each of the houses are based of personality traits, so maybe some sort of personality test." Matilda theorised.

"That makes sense." the girl said.

After Matilda's theory had spread, which had calmed down those worrying that they would be tested on their magic or have to solve puzzles, no one talked much. They were all waiting for Professor McGonagall to return to take them to get sorted.

Then something happened that made the Potters and Saxtons jump about a foot in the air - several people behind them screamed.

"What the -?"

Harry and Matilda gasped. So did the people around them except for the triplets. About twenty ghosts had just streamed through the back wall. Pearly-white and slightly transparent, they glided across the room talking to one another and hardly glancing at the first years. They seemed to be arguing. What looked like a fat little monk was saying: "Forgive and forget, I say, we ought to give him a second chance -"

"My dear Friar, haven't we given Peeves all the chances he deserves? He gives us all a bad name and you know, he's not really even a ghost - I say, what are you all doing here?"

A ghost wearing a ruff and tights had suddenly noticed the first years.

Nobody answered.

"New students!" said the Fat Friar, smiling around at them. "About to be Sorted, I suppose?"

A few people nodded mutely.

"Hope to see you in Hufflepuff!" said the Friar. "My old house, you know."

"Move along now," said a sharp voice. "The Sorting Ceremony's about to start."

Professor McGonagall had returned. One by one, the ghosts floated away through the opposite wall.

"Now, form a line," Professor McGonagall told the first years, "and follow me."

Everyone got in line, with the Saxtons being at the back, and they walked out of the chamber, back across the hall, and through a pair of double doors into the Great Hall. The Great Hall was lit by thousands and thousands of candles that were floating in midair over four long tables, where the rest of the students were sitting. These tables were laid with glittering golden plates and goblets. At the top of the hall was another long table where the teachers were sitting. Professor McGonagall led the first years up here, so that they came to a halt in a line facing the other students, with the teachers behind them. The hundreds of faces staring at them looked like pale lanterns in the flickering candlelight. Dotted here and there among the students, the ghosts shone misty silver. Mainly to avoid all the staring eyes, Harry looked upward and saw a velvety black ceiling dotted with stars.

Hermione whispered to those near her, "Its bewitched to look like the sky outside. I read about it in Hogwarts, A History."

It was hard to believe there was a ceiling there at all, and that the Great Hall didn't simply open on to the heavens.

Professor McGonagall silently placed a four-legged stool in front of the first years. On top of the stool she put a pointed wizard's hat. This hat was patched and frayed and extremely dirty. Everyone in the hall stared at the hat. For a few seconds, there was complete silence. Then the hat twitched. A rip near the brim opened wide like a mouth - and the hat began to sing:

"Oh, you may not think I'm pretty,

But don't judge on what you see,

I'll eat myself if you can find

A smarter hat than me.

You can keep your bowlers black,

Your top hats sleek and tall,

For I'm the Hogwarts Sorting Hat

And I can cap them all.

There's nothing hidden in your head

The Sorting Hat can't see,

So try me on and I will tell you

Where you ought to be.

You might belong in Gryffindor,

Where dwell the brave at heart,

Their daring, nerve, and chivalry Set Gryffindors apart;

You might belong in Hufflepuff,

Where they are just and loyal,

Those patient Hufflepuffis are true And unafraid of toil;

Or yet in wise old Ravenclaw,

if you've a ready mind,

Where those of wit and learning,

Will always find their kind;

Or perhaps in Slytherin

You'll make your real friends,

Those cunning folk use any means

To achieve their ends.

Though there is a new house now beginning

And it may be where your destiny lies

You may not know of what I'm singing

But there you will aim for the skies

So put me on! Don't be afraid!

And don't get in a flap!

You're in safe hands (though I have none)

For I'm a Thinking Cap!"

The whole hall burst into applause as the hat finished its song, though everyone was confused about the verse about a new house. It bowed to each of the four tables and then became quite still again.

"So we've just got to try on the hat!" Harry heard Ron whisper. "I'll kill Fred, he was going on about wrestling a troll."

Professor McGonagall now stepped forward holding a long roll of parchment.

"When I call your name, you will put on the hat and sit on the stool to be sorted," she said. "Abbott, Hannah!"

A pink-faced girl with blonde pigtails stumbled out of line, put on the hat, which fell right down over her eyes, and sat down. A moments pause -

"HUFFLEPUFF!" shouted the hat.

The table on the right cheered and clapped as Hannah went to sit down at the Hufflepuff table. Harry saw the ghost of the Fat Friar waving merrily at her.

"Bones, Susan!"

It could have been her imagination, but Aria swore that the sorting hat looked smug and happy about something just before he shouted out the house.

"NEW HOUSE!"

There was a moment of silence before the Great Hall exploded into noise.

**I hope the verse I added for the new house I'm going to add isn't too bad but it's the best I can come up with. I have some plans for the name and theme for the new house - I plan to call it the Vagabond house with a winged-wolf as the animal, but I don't have the colours - so if you could suggest colours for the new house I would be grateful.**


	9. Chapter 9

**Chapter 9**

"SILENCE!" Dumbledore shouted as he fired some fireworks from his wand.

The hall quickly quietened down.

"What is the meaning of this?" Dumbledore demanded the sorting hat.

Professor McGonagall took the hat off of Susan's head and sent her back to the line of unsorted first-years.

"It's exactly what I said, a new house has been created, as headmaster you should know this could happen." The hat answered.

"What are you talking about?"

The hat sighed. "I guess this is one of the few times it's not your fault, the founders had left a message about a fifth house happening some day to get passed down the headmasters and headmistresses of the school, but I guess the message got lost somewhere along the way so I will have to explain. Back when the founders were still in charge of the school one of their friends, who was a seer, told them that their school would one day need a fifth house in the far future and that I would know when it would happen, so the founders gave me the power of dictating what would happen with this fifth house when the time came. Speaking of."

The Great Hall seemed to expand from the middle and push the Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff away from each other until there was a large space between them, a table like the other tables in the hall suddenly appeared in the gap.

"Now if Miss Bones would sit at her table." The hat said.

Susan looked at Professor McGonagall for guidance, the teacher motioned to the empty table.

"Sit down for now, we'll sort everything out after the sorting." Professor McGonagall said. "Now let's continue with the sorting. Boot, Terry!"

"RAVENCLAW!"

The Ravenclaw table second from the left clapped this time; several Ravenclaws stood up to shake hands with Terry as he joined them.

" Brocklehurst, Mandy" went to Ravenclaw too, but "Brown, Lavender" became the first new Gryffindor, and the table on the far left exploded with cheers.

"Bulstrode, Millicent" then became a Slytherin.

"Finch-Fletchley, Justin!"

"HUFFLEPUFF!"

Sometimes, Harry and Matilda noticed, the hat shouted out the house at once, but at others it took a little while to decide. "Finnigan, Seamus," the sandy-haired boy next to Harry in the line, sat on the stool for almost a whole minute before the hat declared him a Gryffindor.

"Granger, Hermione!"

Hermione almost ran to the stool and jammed the hat eagerly on her head.

"NEW HOUSE!"

Hermione joined Susan at the new table.

When Neville Longbottom, the boy who kept losing his toad, was called, he fell over on his way to the stool. The hat took a long time to decide with Neville. When it finally shouted, "NEW HOUSE," Neville ran off still wearing it, and had to jog back amid gales of laughter to give it to "MacDougal, Morag."

"Malfoy, Draco!"

The blond-haired boy who had rode with the triplets in the boats walked forward with practiced poise. When the hat was placed on his head it looked like it would shout it its decision immediately before it changed its mind, Draco seemed to have a fight with the hat before it shouted, "NEW HOUSE!", and he reluctantly went to the middle table.

There weren't many people left now. "Moon" "Nott" "Parkinson" then a pair of twin girls, "Patil" and "Patil" then "Perks, Sally-Anne" and then, at last - "Potter, Harry!"

As Harry stepped forward, whispers suddenly broke out like little hissing fires all over the hall.

"Potter, did she say?"

The Harry Potter?"

The last thing Harry saw before the hat dropped over his eyes was the hall full of people craning to get a good look at him while his sister gave him a reassuring thumbs up. Next second he was looking at the black inside of the hat. He waited.

"Hmm," said a small voice in his ear. "Difficult. Very difficult. Plenty of courage, I see. Not a bad mind either. There's talent, A my goodness, yes - and a nice thirst to prove yourself, now that's interesting...But I should say that the house you fit into the most is the NEW HOUSE!"

Harry took the hat off his head and walked over to the table and sat opposite Neville. Around the hall people seemed stumped, they were expecting Harry to go to Gryffindor but at the same time maybe him going to the new house meant something.

"Potter, Heather!" Professor McGonagall called out, she then realised the name she had called out and placed her hand over her heart in shock as Matilda walked over to the stool and sat down.

"Heather Potter? Is she related to the boy-who-lived?"

"I thought she was dead."

"I thought the book was fiction."

Matilda heard people whisper about her before she placed the sorting hat on her head as Professor McGonagall was to shocked to do it for her.

"Ah, Miss Potter, I knew I'd be seeing you here today." Matilda heard the hat say.

"Usually it's the other way around." She said.

"Yes, well, if anyone bothered to look at the book of names for children eligible for Hogwarts they would have seen that your name was still there despite you being 'dead'. Now, let's see, you have a large thirst for knowledge and are very smart, especially for your age, you wouldn't be out of place in Ravenclaw, but you are also very braving having lived with the Wormwoods as well as bring down the Trunchbull, you are loyal to your friends as well as cunning with those pranks you played on your family. But I believe you will do best with your brother in the NEW HOUSE!"

Matilda took off the hat and skipped over to the table and sat next to her brother. She suddenly became self-conscious as nearly everyone in the Great Hall was staring at her.

"Can we get on with the sorting, please, I'm hungry!"

Everyone turned to look at Aria, who had been the speaker, she did a very good job at looking like she didn't care that so many people were looking at her.

"Right," Professor McGonagall said, getting over her shock. "Saxton, Aria!"

Once again Aria did a good job of looking like she didn't care as she hobbled over to the front of the hall, her crutches being uncomfortably loud in the silent hall.

"I'd rather stay standing." She told Professor McGonagall.

Professor McGonagall nodded in understanding and placed the sorting hat on her head.

"Oh, it had been a while, I feel lucky to be sorting someone like you again." The hat told Aria.

"Do you mean the me not quite being of this world thing?" Aria asked.

"No, though I've never encountered that before, I mean something that will become clearer when you are older. Until then, your destiny will find root in the NEW HOUSE!"

Professor took the sorting hat off Aria's head and she hobbled over to sit next to Neville with a gap between them.

"Saxton, Layla!"

Layla strode over to the front and sat on the stool, as soon as the hat touched her head in shouted, "NEW HOUSE!", she then went over to the table and sat between Neville and Aria.

"Saxton, Vida!"

A few people whispered about there being three Saxtons at once as Vida walked up to the front, like with Layla the hat barely touched her head before shouting, "NEW HOUSE", she then walked over to the table and sat on the other side of Aria.

And now there were only four people left to be sorted. "Thomas, Dean," a Black boy even taller than Ron, went to the Gryffindor table. "Turpin, Lisa," became a Ravenclaw and then it was Ron's turn. He was pale green as he walked up. Like with Draco Ron seemed to be arguing with the hat before it shouted, "GRYFFINDOR!"

"Zabini, Blaise," was made a Slytherin. Professor McGonagall rolled up her scroll and took the Sorting Hat away.

Albus Dumbledore had gotten to his feet. He was beaming at the students, his arms opened wide, as if nothing could have pleased him more than to see them all there.

"Welcome," he said. "Welcome to a new year at Hogwarts! Before we begin our banquet, I would like to say a few words. And here they are: Nitwit! Blubber! Oddment! Tweak!

"Thank you!"

He sat back down. Everybody clapped and cheered.

"Looks like someone went off the deep end." Aria commented out loud, uncaring of who heard her.

Food and drink filled the five tables, though there was much less on the fifth house table as there was only nine members at the moment. Once the students were eating most of the teachers left, most likely to sort out the whole new house thing.

* * *

The teachers who had left the Great Hall were gathered in the headmaster's office, they sat in a circle with the sorting had in the middle on a table.

"You can't just spring a new house on us without any warning, we need to prepare for these sort of things." Dumbledore pleaded with the hat. "Please just sort the students into the four other houses at least until next year so we can get everything sorted."

"Sorry, my instructions were clear, those children belong in that house."

"But we don't have a common room or dorms, house leader a class schedule, we don't even have a name or theme." McGonagall argued.

"A schedule can be sorted out if you cancel classes for a day of two, as for the house leader and the rest I already have somebody in mind."

"What, who?" Dumbledore demanded.

"For centuries every child who came to this school has passed under by brim and it's one of this school's previous students that will take the role of head of house, she has already been contacted and is on her way."

"How did you contact her?" Professor Sprout asked.

"I didn't, Hogwarts did. This woman is more in tune with magic than most magic users and should have felt the calling Hogwarts sent out."

"Ah." The staff always that the castle was semi-sentient.

"Who is this woman?" McGonagall asked, wondering if she had taught the woman.

"You won't know her but she does have her name on a few of the trophies in the trophy room. She should be here soon."

There was then a knock at the door.

"Who could that be?" Dumbledore asked, wondering who would knock if only the staff knew the current password to the stairs. "Come in!"

The door opened to reveal a fifteen year old girl with shoulder-length silver hair in pigtails and golden eyes, she wore muggle clothing consisting of a white shirt, blue jeans, a red jacket, green scarf, brown mountain boots and a leather satchel.

"Hi, I'm Maria Wild." She introduced herself. "Hogwarts called me here, something about a New House.


	10. Chapter 10

**Chapter 10**

The Hogwarts staff stared at Maria as if she had an extra head.

"Sorry I'm late, apparently the stuff I usually wear isn't acceptable in modern day." She said.

Maria spotted the sorting hat on the table.

"Alistair, how are you?" she asked it.

"I am fine, Miss Wilder, or should I say Wild?" the hat named Alistair replied.

"I changed my name slightly when I went on my pilgrimage, to signify my becoming a new person. Anyway, I guess you all have some questions as to why a teenage girl is on familiar terms with your sorting hat and what I'm doing here in the first place." She addressed the last bit to the staff present.

"Who are you?" Dumbledore demanded.

"Maria Wild, formally Marlinda Wilder, a Shapeshifter who's actually older than all of you despite appearances, former student of Hogwarts, and last member of the Vagabonds."

"What?" someone exclaimed.

Everyone turned to look at the painting of one of the previous headmasters.

"You were a Vagabond?" he asked.

"Oh, hi headmaster. Yes I was." Maria answered.

"But you were so kind and innocent."

"Word of advice, it's always the ones you least suspect." Maria said with a wink. "Anyway, I know about the whole fifth house thing from a book I found while I was a student here, so I know that, but why am I here?"

"Because I have chosen you to become the new head of house." Alistair said.

"Me? Why do you want me to have it?"

"Simple, you and your fellow Vagabonds were defenders of the school, you made it safe from bullying while you were here, and considering your OWL and NEWT scores you're perfectly qualified."

"You already knew I was a Vagabond?"

"I know what Hogwarts knows, and very little gets passed Hogwarts."

Dumbledore then broke in.

"You can't just hire a Shapeshifter." He said.

Maria crossed her arms.

"And why not?" she asked with a raised eyebrow.

"The ministry won't allow it, they'll see you as a threat to the students."

Maria's eyes widened.

"Last I checked Shapeshifters were known for being extremely protective of their own, not a danger to children. What happened to the ministry while I was gone?

"A lot of things you should be chained down for before you listen to them." Alistair said.

"Besides, they can't do anything." Maria said confidently. "The teachers dictate who gets hired and who doesn't, not the ministry."

Most of the staff looked a little shocked about this revelation.

"The wizarding world is a bit uptight about anyone who isn't human at the moment, Filius had a lot of trouble getting and retaining his job for being half-goblin. Even if the ministry can't remove you they'll still try." McGonagall tried to explain.

Maria groaned and rubbed her hands over her face. "I should have never left." She said to herself. "I should have stayed in the ministry instead of going off on that pilgrimage and made sure stuff like this wouldn't have happened."

Maria suddenly snapped out of her reflecting and her smile was back on her face.

"Well, no use moping on what I could have done, I must focus on what I can do." She said. "Despite what the ministry may try I won't let them. I am the head of the ancient and noble house of Wilder as well as a few other titles through inheritance, magic, marriage, etc. so if they do anything I'll come down on them with all the power I have."

Dumbledore tried to take control, he didn't want this person who wasn't under his power to be in Hogwarts and upset his carefully laid plans.

"I'm sorry but I'm not hiring you when I don't know if you're trustworthy, I'm sure one of the other teachers can become the new head of house if we have to keep the fifth house." He said with his best grandfatherly impression.

Maria looked at Dumbledore with distrust, seeing through his grandfather persona and knowing that he wasn't sorry.

"You don't have say Dumbledore." Alistair said smugly, happy he finally one-upped the headmaster. "The founders gave me full control of who would be the head of the fifth house and I say it will be Maria here, as long as she hasn't committed any acts that would make her unsuitable to be a teacher she stays."

"But how do you know that she hadn't?" Dumbledore asked.

"Simple." Maria answered, picking up Alistair and putting him on her head.

It took a bit for Alistair to sort through all of Maria's memories but when he did he found nothing incriminating.

"She's fine to be a teacher." He said.

"Now, I'm guessing that dinner is almost over, so you should get back to your students and we can finish this discussion after they've gone to bed." Maria said.

* * *

The teachers returned to the Great Hall and sent the students off to bed after announcing that classes for the next day would be cancelled, the students of the new house were temporarily set up in some guest rooms until a common room could be sorted out. After that Maria re-joined the teachers and began leading them to where she wanted the new house to be.

"Who were the Vagabonds exactly?" Dumbledore asked Maria curiously as they walked.

"We were sort of the secret defenders of the students, bullying was common when we were in school and the teachers rarely did anything about it if they could do something about it in the first place, my friends and I decided to start playing pranks on those we saw as bullies; as time went on we made a name for ourselves as the Vagabonds, any bullying we found out about was swiftly punished and there was nothing they could do about it, no one knew who we were so they couldn't use the power of their family."

"Where are we going that could possibly serve as a house?" Snape drawled.

"Back when the Vagabonds and I were in school we created our own little lair for us to plan in, I think that could function as the new house." Maria said, ignoring Snape's attitude towards her. "Before I went on my pilgrimage I sealed it up so it should still be hidden."

"You keep mentioning this pilgrimage, why did you go on it?" Flitwick asked.

"As a Shapeshifter age holds no meaning to me, but it did for my friends and loved ones, once they all died I felt lost and so went on a pilgrimage to find myself again, after I became a new woman and took on my new name I decided I preferred life like it was and so kept travelling wherever I wanted."

"Does that mean you don't know any current history?" McGonagall worried.

"I know the main stuff such as the wars and the dark lords, I occasionally went back to the real world to pick up books to read in order to keep up, and there were other travellers that I met and we shared stories."

Maria came to a stop midway down a hall.

"Here we are." She said.

Everyone looked around but found no doors or anything.

"There's nothing here." Snape sneered.

"Not yet." Maria answered.

Maria reached into her satchel and produced a silver amulet, putting it on she reached over to the wall and made an action like turning a door knob, she pushed and the invisible door opened to reveal a small stairwell that led to a dark room.

"This is something that the other Vagabonds and I created, only by wearing one of the amulets can you touch the handle and open the door." She explained. "I guess I'll have to change the locks though because creating the amulets take a lot of time and effort."

"Why didn't you share it?" Sprout asked.

"I think we did originally plan to share it along with some other spells we made once we left school, but I guess we forgot, seven years of sheltered schooling before getting thrust into the real world kind of does that for you. LIGHTS!" Maria shouted as they entered the dark room. "Please don't touch anything until I've checked over it, they could be dangerous after so long." She advised the teachers.

The room was quite large and quite a sight to see. The room was divided into four sections with each section themed after one of the four Hogwarts houses, the ceiling was themed after the Great hall and had been charmed to look like the night sky with glowing orbs lighting up the room. The Gryffindor section of the room was a training area with mats, simple weapons and training equipment. The Hufflepuff section was a lounging area with a fireplace, very comfy looking seats, a small kitchenette and a portrait with three people in it was hanging above the fireplace. The Ravenclaw area was the library area with shelves lined with many books, a few desks and a few art materials. The Slytherin was the planning area for all the pranks, the shelves were lined with pranking supplies, a large desk was covered in plans, and there was a large book on a podium entitled 'History of Vagabond pranks'. At the very centre of the room was a large model of Hogwarts that was fixed to the floor and four mannequins dressed in old fashioned clothes, and there was a door on the far right wall and other on the far left wall.

"You did all this?" McGonagall asked in shock.

"Well, it did take until our last year to fully complete but we did do it." Maria said proudly. "Since there was one of us in each house we decided to have a section to each house with each having a different purpose. The entire are will have to be remade for the students though. And the other two doors lead to a female bedroom and male bedroom, they can probably be expanded into dorm rooms."

"I've never seen some of these books." Flitwick said, marvelling at the bookshelves in the Ravenclaw area.

"Well, they are centuries old, so the other copies might have been lost to time, and some of them are books that my friends and I have written ourselves."

Maria picked out a book from the shelves and gave it to Flitwick.

"The book of Shifters." Flitwick read the title.

"One of the ones I mostly wrote, I was fascinated about my kind and other magic users and creatures capable of changing themselves, so I studied and wrote down my findings. I guess that I'll be sending copies of these to publishers along with the spells, it's not right to keep the information to myself.

"What's this?" McGonagall asked, looking at the model of Hogwarts.

"Nothing special, the Vagabonds and I used it to plan were we would set our pranks, it's meant to be an exact replica of Hogwarts but it turns out Hogwarts is too complex to make an exact replica."

"What are these for?" Sprout asked, fingering the clothes the mannequins were dressed in, each of the mannequins were dressed in the colours of one of the houses.

"Those were the disguises we wore so no one would recognise us, mine was the Hufflepuff one. Anyway, speaking of my friends."

Maria ran other to the portrait, on it were two men and one woman looking to be in their early twenties, they were dressed up in the same outfits as the mannequins with the biggest male being a Gryffindor, the other male being a Slytherin and the female being a Ravenclaw, all three of them were asleep and unmoving.

"Who are they?" Asked Flitwick.

"There are my fellow Vagabonds, Tom (the Slytherin), Jake (the Gryffindore) and Nim (the Ravenclaw). We charmed the portrait so that each of us would automatically be added once we died and stay dormant until it was activated." Maria explained. "Since I'm not dead yet I'm not with them."

Maria drew out a silver wand and tapped it against the portrait, the people on the portrait woke up and looked around.

"It's about time!" Nim exclaimed once she was able to focus.

"Hello to you too." Maria said back.

"How long has it been?" Jake asked.

"Uh, what year is it?" Maria turned and asked the teachers.

"1991." Dumbledore answered.

Tom whistled. "That long, why didn't you wake us up sooner?" he asked Maria.

Maria looked down as the ground inn shame. "I wasn't ready to face you guys after you died and went on a pilgrimage." She then looked up at them. "The reason I'm here now is because Hogwarts has awoken the fifth house and I've been chosen to be the head and I've chosen our old lair to be the house."

All there of the painting gave a shrug. "Fine by us." They said.

"But what will happen to us?" Nim asked.

Maria closed her eyes in thought before opening them and snapping her fingers. "We will need a new lock for the door, how do you feel about being the door guards?"

The three Vagabonds gave another shrug. "If you want." They answered.

"Uh, Marlinda." Jake said, pointing behind her.

Maria turned to see Snape fiddling with some of the pranking supplies in the Slytherin area.

"Hey, I told you not to touch anthing, those are old and likely to go off!" she yelled at Snape, marching over and taking what her was fiddling with out of his hands.

Maria gathered the teachers in the Hufflepuff area.

"I should be able to get this place ready for the students for tomorrow night with the help of Professor McGonagall and Flitwick, and I'll transfer some of the books that the Vagabonds didn't write to the library and the rest of the books to my Gringotts vault until I know what to do with them." Maria said.

"I hope the pranking books will go to your vaults." McGonagall said.

Maria laughed. "Don't worry, it will. Now, I don't believe it's fair on all of you if I'm just a head of house, I should have a teaching position as well."

"What could you teach, all the positions already have teachers." Snape said.

"You look very ugly when you sneer." Nim said from the portrait.

The other Vagabonds and some of the teachers had to place their hands over their mouths to stop themselves from laughing.

"Nim, that's rude." Maria admonished, her voice shaking from laughter.

"He was rude to you first." Nim said, crossing her arms.

Maria rolled her eyes. "Anyway, I looked at the curriculum while you were dealing with the students and saw that you were missing a few subjects from when we were in school, so you could resurrect one of the subjects for me to teach; since the year's already started I can wait until next year to teach the subject and just help out the other teachers until then."

"What subject do you have in mind?" Dumbledore asked, worried about what subject Maria wanted to bring back.

"Religious and cultural studies, it was a class where we were taught about different cultures and beliefs from around the world, I did good in the subject in school and traveling around the world has given me first hand experience."

Dumbledore thought over Maria's suggestion, he didn't currently see how the subject could be a problem to his control over the students, the reason the subject had been dropped was because the school board didn't think it was an important enough subject to keep going when the war against Grindelwald had shortened the number of teachers and some subjects had to be dropped. The other teachers didn't look like they had a problem with the subject either.

"I will talk to the school board about reinstating the subject for next year." Dumbledore said with his usual grandfatherly demeanour, acting like he was happy about the subject being brought back.

"Who do you think your act is fooling?" Nim said.

Everyone looked at the painting just in time to see Tom and Jake put their hands over Nim's mouth to stop her speaking.

"Until then I can help out Professor McGonagall with teaching transfiguration, being a professor, head of house and deputy headmistress must be a lot of work and as a Shapeshifter transfiguration was my best subject." Maria said, bringing attention back to her.

McGonagall though about Maria's offer. "I suppose some help would be nice."

Maria nodded and smiled. "Good. Now, it's getting late and I guess you all need to get work done or some sleep. If anyone needs me I'll be here getting a start on renovating this place, I don't need sleep so I may as well get this done as quickly as possible."

The teachers nodded and left the room.

After they were gone Maria withdrew her wand and cast some detection spell and found listening charms littered around the room, she frowned and quickly removed them, she then waved her wand around again and a couple of books and objects that had been in the room appeared before her, signalling someone had taken them from the room without permission.

"I wonder who among the teachers I can trust." Maria said to the painting of her friends.

"Not the old man or the sneering man, that's for sure." Nim said, Tom and Jake nodding in agreement.

"I know. Anyway, let's start with removing anything of any value and getting it to my vault."


	11. Chapter 11

**Chapter 11**

The students watched as most of the professors left as they loaded food onto their plates and ate.

"A new house, this is unexpected." Hermione said. "All the books I've read never said anything about it."

"You heard the hat, the information got lost in time." Susan said.

"But wasn't it written down somewhere?"

Hermione got shrugs in response.

"My father is not going to be happy about this." Draco complained, picking at his food rather than eating it.

"Why?" Aria asked.

"Because I'm a Malfoy, my family have been in Slytherin for generations and it was expected of me to be one as well."

"Why does it matter what house you're in?" Vida asked, the triplets still couldn't understand it.

"Each house has stereotypes to them, Slytherin is usually viewed as the dark house full of dark wizards but it's also seen as where only pureblood children go; my father wanted me to go there because he sees it as the best house and that only his worthy heir could get it, etc."

"That's barbaric!" Hermione exclaimed.

"Normally I'd just say that you just don't understand magical culture, but I have to agree with this one." Susan said. "And it's not just Slytherin. Ravenclaws are seen as stuck up know-it-alls, Hufflepuffs are seen as duffers and is for leftover wizards that don't fit in the other houses, and Gryffindor are seen as idiotic wizards who charge first and ask questions later, it's also seen as the house where all the light wizards go."

"I wonder what our house is going to be labelled as." Neville said.

"Probably nothing good given the looks we're getting." Vida said with a board tone.

"Speaking of getting looked at, your stares are getting annoying. Can you just come out and say it?" Matilda told those looking at her.

"A-are you re-really Heather P-Potter?" Neville stumbled over his words.

"That's my name." Matilda said. "Though I grew up believing it was Matilda so if everyone would be so kind as to call me that instead."

"How are you alive?" Draco asked. "I thought you were meant to be dead."

"No offence, but I thought you were just a made up character." Hermione admitted, there were so many books out there that the excuse was believable.

"We don't know how. I grew up in the muggle world with no knowledge that the family I lived with wasn't my own, we only found out about my real parents and real name not that long ago." Matilda explained.

"Then how do you two know each other?" Susan asked.

"When we were around seven we were both adopted by a very kind woman after our previous guardians proved incapable of taking care of us." Harry explained.

Thankfully, everyone at the table was polite enough to not ask about their previous guardians.

"I wonder what the new house is going to be like, we don't even know the colour or name." Matilda said.

"I wonder where we're going to sleep." Vida translated Layla's sign language.

"Maybe Hogwarts already had a place set up that no one knows about." Harry suggested.

Everyone shrugged.

After as the dinner disappeared and was replaced with desert the teachers returned, the talk on their table had turned towards families.

"I'm muggle born, so I didn't know about magic until I got my letter." Hermione explained. "What about you, Neville?"

"Well, my gran brought me up and she's a witch," said Neville, "but the family thought I was all- Muggle for ages. My Great Uncle Algie kept trying to catch me off my guard and force some magic out of me - he pushed me off the end of Blackpool pier once, I nearly drowned - but nothing happened until I was eight. Great Uncle Algie came round for dinner, and he was hanging me out of an upstairs window by the ankles when my Great Auntie Enid offered him a meringue and he accidentally let go. But I bounced - all the way down the garden and into the road. They were all really pleased, Gran was crying, she was so happy. And you should have seen their faces when I got in here - they thought I might not be magic enough to come, you see. Great Uncle Algie was so pleased he bought me my toad."

"That's despicable!" Vida cried out. "You could of died."

No one else at the table looked happy about the danger Neville had been placed in either.

"I'm going to write to my aunt about this." Susan said.

"Please don't, they meant well." Neville tried to defend his relatives.

"By what, almost killing you in order to force magic out of you?"

"They should know magic doesn't work that way, you were very lucky with getting dropped out that window." Vida said.

Neville paled when he realised he might have not survived that fall.

"I know it's wrong but they're the only family that can take care of me." He said.

"You should still see a mind healer, regardless of your relatives." Susan advised.

"And get you own wand as well." Aria commented.

"What?" Neville asked as everyone turned to her.

"The wand you have, it's not yours, I can feel it."

"Aria can be sensitive to magic sometimes." Vida explained.

"But...the wand belonged to my father. Gran said I should be honoured to have it." Neville said.

"I was told that a wand chooses its owner when I went to get mine." Hermione said. "That wand won't work well for you since it's not your own, it will make casting more difficult than it needs to be."

"I think that once everything has been settled down you should go to the teachers and tell them you don't have your own wand, hopefully they'll send a letter to your aunt explaining why you can't use your father's wand." Matilda said.

"I guess you're right." Neville agreed.

"And don't forget about seeing a mind healer." Susan put in.

At last, the desserts too disappeared, and Professor Dumbledore got to his feet again. The hall fell silent.

"Ahern - just a few more words now that we are all fed and watered. I have a few start-of-term notices to give you.

"First years should note that the forest on the grounds is forbidden to all pupils. And a few of our older students would do well to remember that as well."

Dumbledore's twinkling eyes flashed in the direction of the a pair of red-haired twins.

"I have also been asked by Mr. Filch, the caretaker, to remind you all that no magic should be used between classes in the corridors.

"Quidditch trials will be held in the second week of the term. Anyone interested in playing for their house teams should contact Madam Hooch.

"And finally, I must tell you that this year, the third-floor corridor on the right-hand side is out of bounds to everyone who does not wish to die a very painful death."

The Saxton triplets' eyes narrowed in suspicion as a few students around the hall laughed, they vowed to find out what the old man was up to with promising a painful death for entering a corridor without giving an explanation as to why.

"And now, before we go to bed, let us sing the school song!" cried Dumbledore. Harry and Matilda noticed that the other teachers' smiles had become rather fixed.

Dumbledore gave his wand a little flick, as if he was trying to get a fly off the end, and a long golden ribbon flew out of it, which rose high above the tables and twisted itself, snakelike, into words.

"Everyone pick their favorite tune," said Dumbledore, "and off we go!" And the school bellowed:

"Hogwarts, Hogwarts, Hoggy Warty Hogwarts,

Teach us something please,

Whether we be old and bald

Or young with scabby knees,

Our heads could do with filling

With some interesting stuff,

For now they're bare and full of air,

Dead flies and bits of fluff,

So teach us things worth knowing,

Bring back what we've forgot,

just do your best, we'll do the rest,

And learn until our brains all rot.

Everybody finished the song at different times. At last, only the pair of red-haired twins were left singing along to a very slow funeral march. Dumbledore conducted their last few lines with his wand and when they had finished, he was one of those who clapped loudest. At the new table no one had joined in on the mot stupid school song they had every heard; Neville, Susan and Hermione were too shy to sing it while the rest didn't want to give away their dignity by singing it, the triplets had their fingers pushed in their ears due to their collective mild fear of loud noises making the signing unbearable for them.

"Ah, music," he said, wiping his eyes. "A magic beyond all we do here! And now, bedtime. Off you trot! Those of the new house will be staying in some guest quarters until proper arrangements are sorted, Mr Filch will show the way!"

A poor and rather foul looking man, at least in the opinion of the triplets, walked towards the children of the new house.

"Follow me." He grumbled, walking out the Great Hall with the children in tow.

Filch led them along some long corridor until he came to a stop in front of a door.

"Go straight in." He grunted before leaving the children.

Harry pushed open the door and stepped inside with the other children following. The room was fairly plain with a fireplace, couch, table, and two other doors which led to two separate bedrooms. Hermione, Matilda, Susan, Vida, Layla and Aria claimed one room while Harry, Draco and Neville claimed the other room; there was six beds in the girls' room but thy went unclaimed as the triplets always slept on the same bed. Everyone was asleep almost as soon as their heads touched the pillow.


	12. Chapter 12

**Chapter 12**

**I think this is the first time I've reached over a 1000 views without one review. Come on people, I want some reviews, I love reading your options.**

After Maria dismissed the teachers and started work on renovating the Vagabond lair Dumbledore went back to his office, he froze all of the paintings before screaming in anger. Everything was falling apart faster than he could fix it. How could a new house just appear like that, and on the year Harry Potter came to Hogwarts as well, it wouldn't have been so bad if it wasn't for Maria Wild, he could have sculpted the new house to be even better than Gryffindor with him as head and the children in it worshiping him, but this woman who clearly wouldn't be fooled by him would be head of house and he couldn't do anything about it for now, and she made it perfectly clear the ministry couldn't do anything. Dumbledore searched his pockets for the spell book he had taken from the Vagabond lair but couldn't find it, he growled when he realised Maria must have had someway to stop the book getting taken.

And it wasn't just Maria the new house, it was who was in the new house, Heather Potter. He, like most people who knew about her, thought that she had died shortly after birth, at first he thought that it was just someone who happened to have the same name but as soon as he saw her he new that she was Harry's sister. He didn't know how it was possible, the body of the baby had been looked over by wizards and confirmed as dead before they filled out the death certificate, yet there she was, in the same house as her brother and they apparently knew each other. And then there was some of the other children in the new house, Draco Malfoy would be a problem and would most likely try and turn both Potters dark, Dumbledore had been sure that the boy would be Slytherin just as much as he was sure Harry would be in Gryffindor, then there was those triplet girls, the Saxtons were a neutral family in both of the wars but the family was always shrouded in secrets.

But Dumbledore was planning as always, once Lucius Malfoy found out about his son not being in Slytherin he would immediately demand a resort which mean Draco would be in Slytherin where he belonged, thus removing the negative influence to the two Potters. He was unsure about the triplets but he decided that he could influence the children to give away their family secrets which he could use in the future, so he'd keep them around for now. He didn't see a problem with the rest of the students in the house, two purebloods and a muggle born, once Malfoy was gone he could start crafting the new house to be the pinnacle of light despite how much Maria would likely get in his way.

* * *

The next morning Professors McGonagall and Flitwick walked towards the Vagabond lair to see how Maria was getting on, when they reached where the entrance was they found that the door had been removed with noises coming from inside. They went inside and found that the lair was much barer than it had been the night before, the practice and prank equipment, books, kitchenette, Vagabond outfits, Hogwarts model, furniture and enchantments on the ceiling were all gone. There was glowing chest in the centre of the room that suggested where everything was.

"Ah, Professors, just who I needed." Maria said. "I've done cleaning up everything, bedrooms included, now I need your help to shrink the main room so we can make more bedrooms."

The two professors understood what Maria meant, they couldn't just magically add new bedrooms without the room to do so, so a space would have to be cleared in order to make them, and the Vagabond lair was much larger than the other common rooms so it made sense to shrink it. Both took out their wands with Maria and they began to carefully resize the room.

"Have you though about what you will name the house?" Flitwick asked Maria as they worked.

"I've decided to name in honour of my group and keep the name of Vagabonds."

"That's nice." McGonagall said. "What about the animal and colours."

"I thinking of a winged-wolf, the Vagabonds had once contemplated on having a symbol animal and we decided on a winged-wolf before discarding the idea. As for the colour, the only one I can think of is purple and white. Feel free to add your own opinions."

"I like them." Flitwick said.

"As do I." McGonagall agreed.

When the three were done the room they were in was much smaller and around the same size as the other common rooms.

"It's weird seeing our old lair be this size." Maria pouted. "Once I'm done with the paint it we'll almost be like the lair no longer exists."

"It's alright, you were very kind in donating your lair." Flitwick comforted her.

"Well, I didn't want the room to go to waste. Now, onto the bedrooms!"

Maria led McGonagall and Flitwick into one of the bedrooms which was empty and coloured in Slytherin and Gryffindor colours.

"I still find it weird seeing Gryffindor and Slytherin colours together." McGonagall commented.

"Now, should we make separate small bedrooms so we don't have to worry about separating the years, or try and make large rooms that are by year?" Maria asked.

"I believe that it should be separate rooms but they can magically expand to fit more that one if some of the students decided to sleep in the same room." Flitwick suggested.

Maria and McGonagall nodded and the three got to work changing the space, when the were done they stood in a long hall was with doors either side along with a bathroom, at the end there was a set of stairs that would lead to a second level as they had the room to make it. The three then did the same to the girls side. They then decorated all of the rooms with purple and white for the new house colours.

"What are you going to do for the entrance?" McGonagall asked.

"It's going to be a two layered thing." Maria answered. "The portrait of my friends will cover where the door used to be and will require a password that will change weekly, after that they'll be another door that will be between the stairs and common room that will require a special key that I'll hand out."

"Bit much isn't?" Flitwick asked.

"Maybe, but I'm a bit paranoid. Now, let's get something to eat, we can finish the rest later."

* * *

"There, look."

"Where?"

"Next to the girl with crutches."

"Wearing the glasses?"

"With the bow in her hair?"

"Did you see their faces?"

"Did you see his scar?"

Whispers followed Harry and Matilda from the moment they left the guest room that served as their temporary dorms the next day. People lining up outside classrooms stood on tiptoe to get a look at them, or doubled back to pass them in the corridors again, staring. Harry wished they wouldn't, because he was trying to concentrate on memorising their way around the school, Matilda didn't seem to mind as she was used to attention after being able to show off how smart she truly was at Cruncham hall.

There were a hundred and forty-two staircases at Hogwarts: wide, sweeping ones; narrow, rickety ones; some that led somewhere different on a Friday; some with a vanishing step halfway up that you had to remember to jump ("This place needs to invest in escalators." Aria had complained). Then there were doors that wouldn't open unless you asked politely, or tickled them in exactly the right place, and doors that weren't really doors at all, but solid walls just pretending. It was also very hard to remember where anything was, because it all seemed to move around a lot. The people in the portraits kept going to visit each other, and Harry was sure the coats of armour could walk.

The ghosts didn't help, either. It was always a nasty shock when one of them glided suddenly through a door you were trying to open. The Gryffindor ghost, Nearly Headless Nick, was always happy to point new Gryffindors in the right direction, but Peeves the Poltergeist was worth two locked doors and a trick staircase if you met him when you were late for class. He would drop wastepaper baskets on your head, pull rugs from under your feet, pelt you with bits of chalk, or sneak up behind you, invisible, grab your nose, and screech, "GOT YOUR CONK!" Surprisingly, Peeves seemed to behave around the Saxton triplets after they had a private talk with him, no one knew what they said to him but they were glad they were safe from him when the triplets were around.

Even worse than Peeves, if that was possible, was the caretaker, Argus Filch. Everyone heard Ron complaining about him and another Gryffindor managing to get on the wrong side of him on their very first morning. Filch found them trying to force their way through a door that unluckily turned out to be the entrance to the out-of-bounds corridor on the third floor. He wouldn't believe they were lost, was sure they were trying to break into it on purpose, and was threatening to lock them in the dungeons when they were rescued by Professor Quirrell, who was passing.

Filch owned a cat called Mrs. Norris, a scrawny, dust-colored creature with bulging, lamp like eyes just like Filch's. She patrolled the corridors alone. Break a rule in front of her, put just one toe out of line, and she'd whisk off for Filch, who'd appear, wheezing, two seconds later. Filch knew the secret passageways of the school better than anyone (except perhaps the Weasley twins) and could pop up as suddenly as any of the ghosts. The students all hated him, and it was the dearest ambition of many to give Mrs. Norris a good kick (which Vida had almost done when the cat kept following her around if not for her sisters pulling her back).

Because of the unexpected development with the new house classes had been cancelled while everything got sorted out, which left the new students to wander the castle and get used to everything. Matilda had found the Hogwarts library and quickly sat down to read the first book that caught her interest, like with the book shop at Diagon alley it took the combined force of Harry and Layla to get Matilda out of the library to the Great Hall in order to eat lunch.

At lunch many people looked up at the head table to look at the new arrival having a conversation with Professor Flitwick, they stared because of her muggle clothes, silver hair, golden eyes, and that she was only fifteen.

"I wonder who she is." Hermione said.

"Maybe something about the new house, she has arrived the day after it was announced." Draco guessed.

The Potter twins and Saxton triplets had just recognised Maria and were wondering what she was doing in the school and wearing muggle clothes.

"Children!" Dumbledore called out as he stood up. "As you're no doubt wondering about our new arrival and I see no reason in keeping it a secret I like to introduce to you the new fifth house's head of house, Maria Wild."

Maria stood up from her seat and bowed to the children, all around the hall loud whispers sounded.

Maria quickly took the speaking roll from Dumbledore. "Thank you, headmaster, I'd like to say something to put their minds at ease." She told Dumbledore.

Dumbledore reluctantly let her speak.

"Hello students, you're no doubt wondering how a teenager could be the new head of house. Well, the truth is that I'm a lot older." Maria changed herself to look like she was in her thirties. "I am a Shapeshifter, one of the abilities granted to me by that is that I'm able to change my age, so I choose to look like a teenager." Maria turned back to fifteen. "Just because I am not human doesn't mean I'm any less or any more than all of you, I won't treat any of you differently and I expect the same towards me. I am also the head of a very powerful family so if any of you feel threatened by others but don't tell because of certain corrupt reasons then you can tell me. Now, everything for the new house has been decided, the name shall be the Vagabonds, the animal shall be a winged-wolf and the colours should be purple and white; as for the values, the sorting hat still hasn't divulged that information."

The Potter twins, Saxton triplets, Neville, Draco, Susan and Hermione looked down at their clothes as the trimming and their ties changed colour to purple and white while the crests on their robes changed from the Hogwarts crest to one with a winged-wold on a shield with the word 'Vagabond' over it. Around the school the Hogwarts crest was changing to incorporate the new Vagabond crest.

"The Vagabond house and dorms shall be finished by tonight so the Vagabonds will follow me after dinner so I can lead them to the house." Maria continued.

Maria then sat down.

"Thank you, Miss Wild." Dumbledore said. "Now, I'm sure you all have questions but I'm afraid they will have to wait until tomorrow as Miss Wild is too busy right now and she is the best person to answer those questions. Tomorrow lessons will return as normal but Miss Wild will be taking over some of Professor McGonagall's lessons for this year. You may now return to your previous activities."

"Well, this is unexpected." Vida stated.

"Wouldn't expect a Shapeshifter to be allowed to teach." Draco commented.

"Why?" Hermione asked.

"Prejudice." Susan said simply. "Before the day is out Dumbledore is going to get letters about our new teacher."

"I better send Gran a letter, she won't be happy if she has to find out from the papers. I need to send the letter about getting a new wand and the mind healer anyway." Neville said.

"You can use Hedwig." Harry offered.

"Thanks." Neville said as he stood up and walked out of the Great Hall along with many other students planning on writing home.

"I'm going back to the library." Matilda said.

Harry and the triplets rolled their eyes but followed her to the library as they currently had nothing better to do than read.


	13. Chapter 13

**Chapter 13**

After dinner was finished the original four houses left for their common rooms while the Vagabonds waited at their table for Maria, she soon joined them and began leading the way to their new common room and dorms, they followed her until she stopped in front of a painting with two men and one woman dressed like highway men in it.

"This is the painting is of the original Vagabonds and they guard the door to your common room, it will only move if you give the password." Maria explained. "The password will change weekly and be provided on the noticeboard inside. This weeks password is 'Greensleeves'."

The painting of the Vagabonds slid to the side revealing a small stairwell with a door at the top.

"The door will only open using one of the enchanted keys that will change every year."

Maria handed out golden keys that were reminiscent of the amulet used to open the original door to the Vagabond lair and used her own to open the door. She walked inside with the children following behind and the door automatically closing behind them. The room was coloured purple and white with a fireplace, the kitchenette and glowing orbs were back along with one of the bookcases (though most of the books were different), there were more comfy chairs along with a couple sofas there was a cupboard full of stationary supplies and art stuff and fake windows to give off that did show the outside.

"It isn't much but it's the best I could do given the time limit" Maria said. "Girl's dorms are to the right, boys are to the left. Everyone can have their own room of choose to share with another, the rooms with automatically resized to fit the number of people sleeping in it, each dorm has two levels with a bathroom on each level, and you can only enter the dorm for your gender, boys cannot go into the girl's side and vice versa."

The children separated into the separate dorms, all but the Saxton triplets chose to have their own room, the triplets sharing a room and their bed as they weren't used to sleeping without each other. They unpacked what they could before settling down into their beds.

* * *

In the morning the members of the Vagabond house slowly woke up, got dressed and trudged into the common room, they were waiting to go to breakfast since it was still fairly early. Maria was also there since she didn't have an office or room of her own as of yet, not that she minded, she just slept in one of her animal forms and didn't expect any students to need her help over the other teachers. Once it became a suitable time for breakfast the Vagabond students and their head left for the Great hall together, on the way out the students picked up their class schedules that had been sorted out and left for the students in each house, when they arrived the students sat down at their table while Maria sat at the head table and started talking with Professor Flitwick.

Suddenly, the Great hall was flooded with owls delivering the morning post, some letters were dropped off as well as a newspaper called the Daily Prophet.

**Potter twin alive!**

**New house at Hogwarts!**

The two headlines were nothing new to the students at Hogwarts but they all knew that they would be new to most of the adults out of Hogwarts and bound to start causing trouble.

"Well, I'm not subscribing to this newspaper." Matilda said with a frown after reading the Daily Prophet she had borrowed. "They're assuming to much just so they can get a story big enough to fill a page. And what does it mean we were unavailable for comment, we haven't gotten any letters and the revelation was only last night."

"Let it go, sis." Harry said.

Matilda sighed and gave the paper over to Vida.

"I see they're already slamming Maria for being a Shapeshifter." Vida said dryly.

"It's amazing how they start making up stuff when they don't have all the facts." Aria commented. "There's nothing here about her except for that and how bad the hiring for Hogwarts must be if they're hiring a half-breed."

Layla got a look of confusion on her face and then wrote something down for everyone to read. 'But a Shapeshifter isn't a half-breed.'

"We know, but they care more about riling up their readers over getting their facts straight." Vida said.

"Isn't that what Kenny said about the paper?" Aria said with a smirk.

Vida just rolled her eyes.

Up at the head table Maria was reading the paper with raised eyebrows.

"Can I sue them for this?" she asked McGonagall.

"Probably not." McGonagall answered. "They haven't out right attacked or made up lies about you."

"But they've made plenty of assumptions, they call me such a degrading term as half-breed when that doesn't even apply to me, I'm not half anything."

"It's because you're kind turns into animals and are well know for living in the wild, like some werewolves." Snape answered with his usual unfriendly tone.

"That's stupid."

"Be that as it may, there are still many people who won't be happy with you being a teacher here, let alone with you being in the walls and near the children." Flitwick warned.

"Once again, that is stupid. Nobody had any problems when I was a student here. And if anyone bothered to research my kind they would find it a grave crime to hurt any sort of child and we are punished by magic itself."

"How does that work?" Snape asked.

"I'm not telling because I don't trust you." Maria answered with a straight face, causing those who heard her to stifle their laughs while Snape went red with anger.

"Anyway," McGonagall interrupted before Snape could cause trouble. "Yesterday I looked up you're school records and have to admit I'm impressed, you got very high marks on all your subjects."

Maria blushed at the compliment. "Thanks, I was told that I had a bright future ahead by my teachers, I spent by time between leaving Hogwarts and my pilgrimage as a on the field healer."

"An on the field healer?" Sprout asked.

"It a healer that would go into a battle field or the area of an attack while it was still going on in order to help the sick and injured."

"That's amazing!"

Maria shrugged. "I'm surprised you don't have them now." She said.

"The advances in magic probably stopped the need for them." Flitwick theorised.

"Getting back to the subject at hand, I've decided to see if you can handle the first to third years for me so that I can focus on preparing my older students for their OWLS and NEWTS."

"Sure, no problem." Maria answered.

McGonagall handed Maria the first to third year transfiguration schedules.

"Thank you. You can also share my office until we can get you one of your own." McGonagall said.

"Oh, thanks." Maria said.

Soon breakfast finished and the teachers moved towards their classrooms before classes were due to start.


	14. Hiatus

Sorry I haven't uploaded recently, but a lot of things have been happening in my life recently and I need to focus on my collage work more, and I've sort of lost drive to continue this story for now. So, until a later date, this story is now on hiatus. Sorry.


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